Thinking aloud about stars

Crowqueen

comic_sans wrote: »

Yeah, true, they may have lost your business due to a buyer misunderstanding the star rating!!

I cant quite recall when the DSRs came into play, but it has put the power in the hands of the buyer in many ways. of course the buyer must be protected, but due to the rating system not being fully understood it can put a good seller out of business.

feedback seems a more fairer way to do it, an the DSRs can make some sellers lazy. my listings always do well due to clear and accurate descriptions, good photographs and good communication, however i can be seen to be a poor seller at the drop of a hat by a buyer who isnt happy with the cost of p&p for example

No, sorry, I don't agree. Sellers who don't please their customers anywhere get put out of business, not just on eBay. For starters most main marketplace sites have some sort of feedback system to sort the wheat from the chaff. Heck, look at Ratners. One loose word on TV and Gerald Ratner went out of business virtually overnight. Feedback is not unique to eBay, neither is strict buyer protection.

If your buyer isn't happy with P&P then do something about it. That's the person who keeps you in business, like it or not.

The buyer is THE most important part of the selling process. Buyers should be protected because they are the ones who spend the money. Full stop. If it wasn't for buyers, there would be no eBay and no sellers. Furthermore, legally speaking, buyers are given rights because otherwise the seller would have no incentive to sell properly. The seller is in complete control of most of the process from the buyer's payment onward and that is why there are so many rights attached to buying.

Good sellers know this and work within it. Bad sellers are in denial and usually start off by saying the buyers need education. Well, I'm sorry, I don't, I'm quite capable of spending my money and giving feedback on how that money has been handled. eBay is not Facebook or Big Brother - when it comes to money changing hands you just cannot run the site based on sellers' own evaluations of how they perform. You have to allow the buyers to have that final say.

Buyers DO NOT usually misunderstand the DSR system - the averages are set by the buyers, the poor sellers usually stand out from the good ones, and that's what I base my feedback on when I leave it. It's pretty arrogant to say otherwise.

comic_sans

Crowqueen wrote: »

Same here. I've given up whole categories of items on eBay because of poor experiences - in fact it is more accurate to say there are certain things I will buy on eBay, not certain things I will not buy.

absolutely, however if i am feeling particularly reckless and take a chance on a certain type of item i will put so many filters on it brings my choice down to only two or three sometimes!!

however, this way i can honestly say i have virtually no problems in with eBay in 7+ years

soolin

I do tend to agree with Crowqueen on some of the points made. If all buyers were routinely misunderstanding stars then all of us sellers would be suffering. We can all meet a poor buyer, but it would seem odd for a single seller to meet large numbers of poor buyers who all misunderstand how stars work.

The fact that the majority of sellers manage to maintain 4.7 stars and above suggest that the problem of poor stars is not widespread. That really takes me back to the pyschology of stars, how do we as sellers ensure that our buyers leave us the best posisble stars? What can we do to ensure that we don't get knocked back for something out of our control?

Crowqueen

soolin wrote: »

Time after time the free post ones make at least £1 more than the ones with postage charged...I cannot figure that one out at all.

That's where psychology comes in, Soo - it's because irrational behaviour exists that sellers need to take some notice of it.

Sorry, Comic, to come down on your head about it. I'm just fed up with people just thinking they are talking to other sellers here.

And thanks for your comments, Soo. Hopefully as a buyer I can give some people some insights that might otherwise be missed.

soolin

Crowqueen- at the moment I am actually buying more than I am selling, hence my thinking aloud thoughts. All this buying though is due to a cunning business plan, already partly implemented but due to be rolled out come the Autumn.

comic_sans

Crowqueen wrote: »

No, sorry, I don't agree. Sellers who don't please their customers anywhere get put out of business, not just on eBay. For starters most main marketplace sites have some sort of feedback system to sort the wheat from the chaff. Heck, look at Ratners. One loose word on TV and Gerald Ratner went out of business virtually overnight. Feedback is not unique to eBay, neither is strict buyer protection.

If your buyer isn't happy with P&P then do something about it. That's the person who keeps you in business, like it or not.

The buyer is THE most important part of the selling process. Buyers should be protected because they are the ones who spend the money. Full stop. If it wasn't for buyers, there would be no eBay and no sellers. Furthermore, legally speaking, buyers are given rights because otherwise the seller would have no incentive to sell properly. The seller is in complete control of most of the process from the buyer's payment onward and that is why there are so many rights attached to buying.

Good sellers know this and work within it. Bad sellers are in denial and usually start off by saying the buyers need education. Well, I'm sorry, I don't, I'm quite capable of spending my money and giving feedback on how that money has been handled. eBay is not Facebook or Big Brother - when it comes to money changing hands you just cannot run the site based on sellers' own evaluations of how they perform. You have to allow the buyers to have that final say.

Buyers DO NOT usually misunderstand the DSR system - the averages are set by the buyers, the poor sellers usually stand out from the good ones, and that's what I base my feedback on when I leave it. It's pretty arrogant to say otherwise.

i hope you don't misunderstand with what i am saying as i agree with virtually all you are saying. of course the buyers should be protected and of course the bad sellers should be highlighted, my point was that for those that DONT understand the DSRs, they can break a good seller, i am not suggesting all buyers dont understand them by any means.

for the record, i am a good seller with excellent feedback and ratings, but i know exactly the sellers you are refering to who have bad ratings and try to shift the blame onto a buyer, i was merely looking at this from both sides

comic_sans

Crowqueen wrote: »

That's where psychology comes in, Soo - it's because irrational behaviour exists that sellers need to take some notice of it.

Sorry, Comic, to come down on your head about it. I'm just fed up with people just thinking they are talking to other sellers here.

And thanks for your comments, Soo. Hopefully as a buyer I can give some people some insights that might otherwise be missed.

ha ha! no probs! no i think i should just water down my original point, i mean i love a good ebay discussion, but my only point really was this..
an unexplained low average to a good seller could be explained by somebody with their own thinking of how the ratings work, i didnt mean to suggest that all buyers dont know how it works, so apologies for that, but i stand by it, it is true that some people would literally award a 3, thinking they are doing the seller a favour!

comic_sans

soolin wrote: »

I do tend to agree with Crowqueen on some of the points made. If all buyers were routinely misunderstanding stars then all of us sellers would be suffering. We can all meet a poor buyer, but it would seem odd for a single seller to meet large numbers of poor buyers who all misunderstand how stars work.

The fact that the majority of sellers manage to maintain 4.7 stars and above suggest that the problem of poor stars is not widespread. That really takes me back to the pyschology of stars, how do we as sellers ensure that our buyers leave us the best posisble stars? What can we do to ensure that we don't get knocked back for something out of our control?

no, i agree, its not widespread, but it does happen, but anyhow, i am very interested in the psychology of selling, and i think that the only thing that can let you down as a seller if everything else in order is indeed literally things out of our control, P&P

without offering free P&P, it really is down to offering things like combined shipping, and although the rating is for charges, the way the item is packed also makes a huge difference. my parcels always arrive looking like a traditional brown paper parcel where applicable and this has become my 'thing'. i think my buyers like it, and it shows i care about the whole operation from start to finish. it doesnt cost me anymore than other packing materials, but it looks good!

theoretica

It seems strange to me that ebay's descriptions of what the stars mean (3*= neither good nor bad, 4*=good) do not match the way they use them. I guess grade inflation struck and too many people were leaving undeserved praise. When they introduced the system and I saw their descriptions my thoughts were that a boring transaction with nothing particular in either way should score 3s as default, 2s and 4s are for minor praise or irritation and a 5* should be as outstandingly good as a 1* is bad. I probably irritated several sellers undeservedly at that time. Now I mostly don't fill in the stars as I am not going to leave 5s unless I feel they are deserved by my standards. Silly system.

Crowqueen

theoretica wrote: »

It seems strange to me that ebay's descriptions of what the stars mean (3*= neither good nor bad, 4*=good) do not match the way they use them. I guess grade inflation struck and too many people were leaving undeserved praise. When they introduced the system and I saw their descriptions my thoughts were that a boring transaction with nothing particular in either way should score 3s as default, 2s and 4s are for minor praise or irritation and a 5* should be as outstandingly good as a 1* is bad. I probably irritated several sellers undeservedly at that time. Now I mostly don't fill in the stars as I am not going to leave 5s unless I feel they are deserved by my standards. Silly system.

Leave 4s then and help bring the averages down.